The above letter is printed in this week's Enfield Independent from a pensioner in Oakwood. 

The following is extracted from The Big Red Book, 2014 Edition

From page 11

Top questions asked

1. Why have London’s buses gone cash-free? Cash use in London has been very low, at around one per cent of all journeys by the end of April 2014. By going cash-free, .... This puts London’s bus service at the forefront of innovation and [operators] can feel proud to be a part of the biggest fares policy change in over a decade. There has been no change to Oyster or to concessionary passes as part of going cash-free.

In December 2012, we introduced acceptance of contactless payment cards (CPCs) on our bus services.

In 2014, we introduced a ‘one more journey’ feature on Oyster. Also, we are extending acceptance of CPCs to other services and introducing capping to further encourage their use as an alternative to cash payments.

Passengers who turn up and attempt to pay with cash should be asked if they have another way to pay for travel. If they have no alternative method of payment, [the operator] should politely refuse to let them travel on [their] bus unless you feel they could be vulnerable.

From Page 101

Vulnerable passengers

Do not leave anyone stranded if they are vulnerable or obviously in distress. For example:

• Young or older people
• People who could be at risk if left behind, including those in isolated places or at quieter times
• People who are disabled, injured, unwell or who have had an accident, assault or similar incident
• People who show you a travel support card and may have learning difficulties.

Not all impairments are obvious If you decide to let someone travel in this situation you must issue an Unpaid Fare Report (see page 122, below)

From Page 122

A general rule of thumb:

• A young vulnerable person in school uniform travelling towards school, at the beginning of the school day should return HOME
• A young vulnerable person in school uniform travelling FROM school at the end of the school day should be carried towards home

A driver/operator ALWAYS has the option of using his radio to make a "Code Blue" to seek authority or instructions

On boarding a bus the video image of the passenger will be captured by the front door camera

REMINDER From the route number, location and time of day/vehicle registration number, it is possible to identify the vehicle's progress using the GPS/iBus reporting system data.....

if you wish to report an incident, it is preferable to use e-mail rather than the  telephone

mailto: customerservices.buses@tfl.gov.uk